What to do in the Galapagos Islands

There are many scenic walking trails in the Galapagos. No matter how you plan to visit, on a cruise or via a land-based tour, you’ll have the opportunity to enjoy them. Many excursions include shorter guided nature walks, but you’ll find longer trails and a variety of walks to do on your own. On Santa Cruz Island, a fabulous self-guided day walk to Tortuga Bay leads from the southwest edge of town to a long white beach, winding through scrubby forest for about two miles. At the far end of the beach, you’ll find a lagoon ideal for snorkelling or swimming as well as spotting wildlife like marine iguanas, blue-footed boobies, flamingos, finches, brown pelicans, and Sally Lightfoot crabs, amongst others. Isabela offers one of the best hikes, following a trail along the rim of the Volcan Chico, bringing views of steaming fumaroles, a variety of birds, and Galapagos giant tortoises.

If you don’t want to get into the water by snorkelling or diving to see the marine life, you can do it by glass-bottom boat. Look down on vibrant coral reefs and watch for a sea turtle or the Galapagos penguin to whiz by. You’ll get up close and personal to it all without having to put on a wetsuit. Radiba island is popular for glass-bottom boat rides, with sea lions pirouetting right beneath the waves. It’s easy to admire the antics of cormorants that dive for their meals and see marine iguanas who have evolved to live here on the islands without freshwater, soaking up the Pacific waves, filtering out the salt instead of enjoying a drink. If you’re on a cruise, many vessels include glass-bottom boats for their passengers who want to stay dry while watching the wildlife.

You can hike up the active Sierra Negra Volcano, one of five active volcanoes on Isabela island. It last erupted in 2018 and you will hike up to the second-largest volcanic crater in the world. The trek starts in lush green terrain filled with wildlife, you will trek up to the rim of the caldera which is an impressive 6 miles wide, before continuing to the area where the lava flows and the steam comes out of thermal vents. It is a 16km hike and takes 5-6 hours.